Lollapalooza

About This Event

Lollapalooza is Chicago's biggest annual music festival, full stop — four days, eight stages, the Grant Park lakefront as the backdrop, and a lineup that regularly runs past 170 acts across every genre on the dial. The 2027 dates aren't official yet (organizer C3 Presents typically announces in late fall or winter), but the festival has landed on the same late-July-into-August weekend for two decades running, and Grant Park is locked in as its home through at least 2032 under the city's current contract with C3.

It started as something else entirely: a 1991 farewell tour dreamed up by Jane's Addiction frontman Perry Farrell, one stage at a time, meant as a goodbye, not a tradition. It toured through most of the '90s, collapsed under its own finances by 1998, tried and failed to relaunch in 2003 and 2004, then came back for good in 2005 — this time planted permanently in Grant Park instead of touring city to city. It grew from two days to three in 2006 and eventually into the four-day format it runs today, and it's been Chicago's own ever since.

Worth knowing before you plan around it: neither the exact 2027 dates nor the lineup are confirmed as of this writing — sources disagree on whether it closes Aug 1 or Aug 3, which is exactly why the card above flags it rather than guesses. Four-day GA passes have historically sold out fast, in the $365–400+ range, well before any lineup is even announced — historically not a decide-once-the-headliners-drop kind of ticket.